After Helen (and Phil, and David)

From 2006

Whether it limps along to 2008 or not, Helen Clark will not be leader of the Labour Party within three years. Caucus must be looking at each other and considering who the successor could be... so I thought I'd go through some of them:

- Michael Cullen. Well he could, but he's part of the same tired generation, ex. Cabinet Ministers..

Update

and that's where it ended.  Phil Goff of course succeeded and did an admirable job of ensuring Labour couldn't move beyond its core.  David Shearer has repeated this, despite being a rather decent chap, and now it is Silent T.

Labour's problem is quite fundamental.  Nowadays it touts class warfare and mild xenophobic rhetoric in the hope it can win support from the neo-Marxist Greens and the fear-mongering NZ First, but none of this is new.

Until it can be innovative, and seek to advocate more than just the usual formula of more government spending and regulation, it faces being outdone on that front by the Greens, and being seen as relatively uninteresting.   Meanwhile, the Nats can always say it is risky to vote for Labour because you'll get whacky Green policies with it - and despite the lack of serious scrutiny of the Greens, most voters run a mile from their politics.

National meanwhile is playing the semi-Muldoonist "safe pair of hands" approach, so that a plurality of voters are happy not to rock the boat.

So Labour looks like getting relatively nowhere in the 2014 general election, hoping only that the Nats might have to get into bed with Winston Peters, which ought to poison the Nats enough to give Labour a reasonable run at power in 2017 or sooner.

It's hardly an inspiring strategy.

Egypt's problems wont be solved by elections

You see in Egypt the problem comes from the politicians and they arise from the culture.

Unfortunately Egypt has a culture of  kleptocracy, corruption and favouritism. 

When he was President, Hosni Mubarak enriched himself to the tune of US$42 billion.  This is scandalous but hardly unexpected, because politicians in absolute power will both use violence to retain power and will be thieving bastards one and all.  Yet this is what politics does.  By granting unlimited power to people elected or otherwise, they do violence to others, they collect money through violence and can use it to corrupt, and can be corrupted to change laws, grant contracts and the like. 

It is what politics can do and does, and liberal democracy doesn't contain it, culture does.  In the US, politics is corrupted because people seek favours from politicians in the forms of money or privileges granted by the state.  However, there is an independent judiciary and free press, so there are institutions in place that can contain this.

In Egypt this doesn't exist.  It is stuck between the kleptocratic authoritarian culture of the army, which has deep roots in business and the economy well beyond what should be its core role.  

However, Islam also has deep roots that mean that a significant plurality of Egyptians are quite happy for the state and religion to be as one, meaning non-Muslims in Egypt face serious risks of oppression and discrimination by the state.

So when foreign observers call for free and fair elections, that's all very well, but what is the reason for this?  What do they want for Egyptians?

Iranians start to stand up

Following Egypt, Iranians protest against their gerrymandered theocratic "democracy", that allows any point of view as long as it supports the status quo.

Good for them.  Iran's theocratic dictatorship brutally suppresses political dissent, it executes more people than any country other than China, including rape victims and children.

update

OK so I didn't say much then.  However,  Iranians appear to have released their urge for reform by voting for the most reformist candidate they were allowed, who may - at best - ease the absurd economic policies that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had inflicted upon them all.  Hassan Rouhani has proven himself to be at least amenable to diplomacy over confrontation and has reduced internal pressure for major reform.

However, let's not get too excited.  Iran still imprisons political dissidents.  Iran still executes apostates. Iran is still intervening in the Syrian Civil War on the side of the Assad dictatorship (primarily on sectarian grounds) and in Iraq.  However, its imperialism gets nary a peep of criticism from the so-called peace movement.

There is a long way to go, and Hassani wouldn't be President if the regime thought he might seriously undermine this theocracy.

Yet it is also clear that he has been brought in to save the regime from the ineptness of past leadership bankrupting the economy and sabre-rattling.  This does not include abandoning its nuclear programme or the capability to develop a nuclear weapon, but it might mean stalling it or containing it, and drastically curtailing Iran's long standing policy of extending support to the likes of Hizbollah and other Islamists (but not Al Qaeda) in other parts of the world.

The key point being that Iran wants the end to economic sanctions so it can grow, although this wont be enough for the largely cosmopolitan population of Tehran, aching for more personal freedom, it will remove pressure for reform elsewhere.

So at best there is hope that Iran will threaten the outside world less, especially Israel, but it will still imprison and murder its own people for blasphemy against Islam and seeking a government that isn't theocratic.  For all of that, it will and should remain a pariah.

New Zealanders for Gaddafi?

As Muammar Gaddafi engaged in slaughter against the Libyan people, it may be timely to note those with a high profile in New Zealand who thought he had a lot going for him.

The leftwing blogosphere has plenty wishing for his overthrow, even calling for military intervention of some kind.  The Greens are even supporting a revolution.

I guess if a high profile New Zealander talked favourably about Gaddafi now, it would not be seen in a positive light.  Though I can't be so sure of that.

Yet when it comes to those who have been to Libya, spoken favourably of it and were friendly to the Gaddafi regime, it's "ok".  Those people are forgiven.  Yet John Key when asked by a journalist whether he would tell Mubarak (a clearly far less brutal dictator, and no war-mongerer) to resign, he said no - and got excoriated for it.

The hard left community has long been soft towards Libya, because for years Libya was anti-American, it supported revolutionaries all over the world, including Maori nationalist thugs who wanted armed rebellion in New Zealand.  Gaddafi always felt a soft spot for anyone wanting to take on the liberal democratic West.

The late Syd Jackson being one of those thugs. 

He went to Libya to see Gaddafi's theories in practice and met him, and discussed Libya imposing trade sanctions on New Zealand.   Idiot Savant preferred to just consider him a union leader and broadcaster, brushing over his Gaddafi-philia.  However, the left is remarkably forgiving of its own kind being friendly with known mass murderers, typically dismissing accusations by claiming its opponents are the same - it's the plea of the man who beats up his wife who points out that the man over the road is beating up his wife too, why don't you harass him?

It is hardly a robust defence.

Hone Harawira spoke fondly of him, but only Dr. Pita Sharples and Tariana Turia - both Ministers in the current government said this on his passing:

"He had the keen intellect to grasp complex issues, a quality which you would see coming through in campaigns such as encouraging Libya to boycott trade with New Zealand".

None of those current MPs can really be said to be particularly negative towards Gaddafi.

I'm not exactly trusting of Sharples and Turia to be keen identifiers of intellect.

It is not just Syd though.  Keith Locke was once sympathetic, as can be seen in this "Just Peace" newsletter penned by him on the Green Party website where he calls for:

"if you wish to take part as one of the walking wounded representing countries bombed and oppressed by the US government" listing Libya as one of them.

The fact Gaddafi's regime was sponsoring terrorism across the world, including the UK and Germany and had been waging war against Chad didn't matter.

Keith has only just started protesting against Libya.  You see he saw Libya as a "victim" as well, with the "see no evil" hands over his eyes when Libya killed people in other countries.

Apparently ruthless military/socialist dictatorships can't be imperialist.

However, New Zealand is always so forgiving of those who cuddle up to thugs, with the mass media largely willing to give them a free pass.

and now

Gaddafi is gone, and there was nary a peep of concern expressed by those who might be thought to have been his friends.  Those who once gave succour to his regime (and gained it) will forever keep a low profile.

The posts that didn't make it

I have over 100 blog posts that I didn't finish, that got interrupted, so given my other commitments at this time, I've decided to tidy some of them up and send them out.   The main reason I didn't post them was timing, and I wasn't happy with the content, so they may be shorter than usual (some of you will be pleased). 

Given I have enough for two a week for a whole year and I'll probably cull half of them for good, I expect to send out that many over the next few months, and include a postscript that updates my thinking on the specific issue.